That's a pretty good summary of the 3 hatch lair build Gondolin, a few details:
1. The first corsair should be in your base when your spire finishes, so you don't actually know how many corsairs he is making until he sends them to you. Make like 6 scourge when spire completes just in case. That should be able to drive back the first 3 corsairs he makes if he does, and contain him in terms of air control. Plus you should use extra scourge to scout anyway, so they are worth the cost.
2. Make hydras as the situation calls for it, I wouldn't make too many right when den finishes, that's counter-productive. For example, if I can defend ground with speedlings and a couple of sunkens, air with a few scourge, then I wouldn't make any hydras at all in early game. It's not like you can attack him with slow hydras anyway, why not make more drones if you are safe?
3. Against mass sairs don't forget to get borrow. Toss will have to rely on drops to harass your drones directly. A cheap borrow upgrade is critical.
4. Second gas timing depends on how much gas you need. If I scout no stargate, I'll take my second gas right away to get gas for mutas. In terms of timing, your opponent's core should complete right before your lair finishes, so look for that stargate. If there is a stargate, mutas are no good because the possibility of sair/dt is very effective, in that case since I'm not going mutas, I don't need so much gas and the second gas can be taken after spire completes.
On July 03 2008 18:02 Bifur wrote: 7 pool can be upgraded this way: 7 Pool 6 Drone 7 Overlord 7 Drone 8 (3 pairs of lings) This gives you an economic advantage and Drone+Overlord+drone after 7 pool gives enough time for 3 larva to pump out exactly when pool is finished
Thank you for this, updated!
On July 04 2008 09:15 Fangster wrote: I have a quick question.
About how many lurkers would be "critical mass" vs zeals?
Hmm... well there is not really a critical mass of lurkers against zealots because no Protoss will go pure zealots of course, there will be dragoons and templars, archons, etc. But otherwise, zealots really take huge damage once you get about 4-6 lurkers (and thus die very quickly), however a competent Protoss will run past your lurkers and then attack with zealots, minimizing splash damage.
====================== Thanks sMi.lols for the tips! I have just one more question - in that if you see +1 attack coming from the Protoss you can generally assume that even if he has the Stargate up, it'll be safe to go mutas? When I'm doing the build whenever I see +1 I just go mutalisks, and it seems it's been working nicely though... but I'm not too familiar with Protoss options... obviously I don't want to lose the timing window of attack with mutalisks. Of course the tech route must be chosen even before that though to determine the timing of your second gas... so if you see 1 stargate (generally for them scouting I guess) and +1, how would you react? I think mutalisks are still definitely viable, just like in the game I played against ToSs[pOt] because I still did some nice damage, but are there better alternatives?
Well, the whole point of the stargate build is so that toss can scout in time to cannon up properly, and not take damage from mutas. Your opponent scouted you on time, but he failed to defend properly. Your mutas wouldn't have done much damage if he had defended better. What happens afterwards is that toss starts to mass corsairs in his base, use dts to harass while building speedlots and a robotics for drop play. A serious issue with the muta build is that we have slow ovie and hydra speed up, which makes it very difficult to defend drops and dts. And an even bigger problem is that there is a timing attack window for the protoss as soon as he gets enough corsairs to regain air control, at which point your mutas become useless and you might not have enough hydras to defend his push.
This game Savior vs Bisu on reverse temple is a perfect example of why NOT to make mutas when there is a stargate. Now of course we are not playing bisu level protoss, but we are not savior level zergs either, so...yea I think mutas are viable but I think it is a more difficult continuation choice.
Just go with our hydra scourge continuation and you should be fine. A stargate and a corsair reduces the amount of zealots he can make, so we should have enough hydras to deflect anything.
Anyway, here is a game I played that shows how to continue macro after gaining advantages with mutas. I got a few lings in his base...that delayed his core and costed him the game as his timing was thrown off.
What do u think about adding 9 Pool and Overpool strategies into ur guide (i mean of course version without taking gas and getting speed)? Overpool is great build in ZvP because it is so safe and gives chance to kill his probe quickly. What about 9 Pool? This forces cannon first and is used many times by progamers. What do u think about that?
Oh mighty Superior Wolf, you have helped me so much. Up until now Zerg's play was just a mystery for me, and I never knew what is in the zerg player's mind. Now I know it all, and will adapt my Protoss skills to demolish the swarm!
@Blu-Ray - Done and done! Both of those builds were added into the guide. @N037 - I don't have plans to make any extensive ZvT or ZvZ guides, although I wish I could make a 2v2 guide, it seems like it would be impossible because 2v2 has so much more strategy and situational... uhh situations -_-;; that are involved than that involved in 1v1. Fairly large update today, I'm trying to keep up with the rate of modern ZvP but it's evolving quite quickly! Regardless, I added a lot of information and specifics, although I still need to touch a bit more on drone production. The guide has come from a small 8,000 word guide and is now over 14,750 words. I'm especially still interested in the 3 Hatch Lair style, btw. w3jjj / sMi.lols, we're in the same clan now but I haven't had the chance to talk to you more on modern ZvP (and I see how active you are in iCCup :p). I'd like to know your opinion on the Den/Spire lurker variation as opposed to Spire, then 5 hatch hydra or lurker, it would be nice to discuss
Changelog: Version 1.5 (October 23, 2008) -Updated many sections (fixed grammar, errors, etc.) -Added a new part of the scouting section (how to identify Protoss strategies) -Fixed incorrect builds, added more information (6 pool, 9 overpool w/o speed, 3 hatch den/lair) -Tried to cater guide to more recent trends in modern ZvP (3 hatch den/lair, ways to identify Protoss strategies) -Hotkeys in FAQ (my personal hotkeys) -Elaboration on Queens (queens or not?) -14,500+ words
And of course, while I love that you address Queens, expanding a little bit more on the uses of Ensnare, particularly addressing inability of Protoss to flee, an advantage in maneuverability for you, and decrease of Protoss DPS could be useful. Feel free to lift sections from my thread haha :D
(I love Queens. They should be used more....come back chojja...and eri too! )
Yes, I should elaborate more on queens! They are such an interesting unit, and it would be really cool to see them used at least sometimes. I'll get to that right away. Of course there's a lot of disadvantages to queens in many circumstances, but can be very very useful and in certain situations more useful than defilers imo. Some people just really hate queens however and are totally opposed to the idea of using them, so we'll have to see if they ever get used :p For me, I'm thinking of making a smurf account on iCCup and solely testing queens as a valid unit for standard play. I'd love to see how they work! Thanks for the input
On October 24 2008 12:23 Superiorwolf wrote: Okay, I added some more on queens and put some links to your thread for further theorycrafting and discussion on queens :D
Haha, I fucking love them. Such an underused unit.
They're a very good unit to use against Sair/DT or Reaver/Sair builds with Ensnare and Parasite, for obvious reasons. I'm looking forward to those replays, by the way ;D
(I think I'm going to start ZvPing instead of PvP even though my PvP is a better mu for me...I just want to develop that one mu and try and incorporate queens into my gameplay hahaha)
EPT
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